Espinoza believes Mayweather-Pacquiao 2 is possible

By Boxing News - 04/12/2016 - Comments

Image: Espinoza believes Mayweather-Pacquiao 2 is possibleBy Chris Williams: Showtime Sports vice president Stephen Espinoza believes that a rematch between Floyd “Money” Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao is possible if the boxing fans want the fight. Espinoza was impressed with what he saw of the 37-year-old Pacquiao last Saturday night with his performance against Tim Bradley at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Espinoza thinks Pacquiao looked as good as he has in the last four years with that fight. But for a second match-up between Mayweather and Pacquiao to take place, it’s going to require that the fans want to see that because Mayweather will only decide to come back if he feels that there’s a ton of interest in a fight between him and Pacquiao.

“Really in terms of a Mayweather rematch, it’s really up to the audience, to the fans and the writers,” said Espinoza to Ringtv.com. “I know from talking to Floyd — if there’s demand for a particular fight — I think he will give it strong consideration. But I think this is one where we’re not going to put the cart before the horse. If people are interested in that fight, then I think they’ll make their voices heard and we’ll start working on it.”

I don’t think there’s going to be a tremendous amount of interest from fans in a Mayweather-Pacquiao fight right now. It wasn’t a good enough opponent for Pacquiao in his win over Bradley to drive interest in a second Mayweather-Pacquiao fight. To get fans interested in a second bout between those two fighters, Pacquiao would need to continue his career and beat someone good like Keith Thurman, Danny Garcia, Saul “Canelo” Alvarez, Shawn Porter or Gennady Golovkin.

Beating a shopworn Bradley won’t do the trick, because it’s already been done before by Pacquiao. I think that was a mistake by Pacquiao’s promoter Bob Arum to have Pacquiao fight Bradley again rather than someone outside of the Top Rank company like Canelo, Amir Khan, Adrien Broner, Danny Garcia, or Keith Thurman.

It has to be new blood for Pacquiao, and it can’t be Arum’s fighters because he doesn’t have anyone good enough in the 147lb division to excite fans. No, Jessie Vargas isn’t going to do it for Pacquiao. He can beat Vargas every day of the week, and I don’t think it’s going to motivate Mayweather to want to fight Pacquiao again.

“With that performance, what Manny showed is that he still has the ability to perform at a high level and arguably at a higher level than he did last May,” said Espinoza. “So whatever the reason, if people believe that the outcome or really the fight will be different this time, I think there could be some interest that is building for that fight.”

More than anyone, I’d like to see a rematch between Pacquiao and Mayweather, but I don’t think the feeling is mutual in the casual boxing community. Pacquiao clearly lost to Mayweather last year, and then said he was injured. When Pacquiao did finally come back after 11 months out of the ring, he fought a guy he’d already beaten twice in Tim Bradley. It was the equivalent of a struggling college student, who had just flunked an important math class in higher match, going backwards in his academic career to retake a class that he’d aced with an ‘A’ grade in a lower level math class.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gw_6uVm0MOg

The move made no sense for Pacquiao, and one gets the sense that his promoter Arum didn’t think it through clearly when making the fight. The Pacquiao vs. Bradley 3 fight had greed and complacency written all over it. Instead of trying to take a new challenge in a fight against someone that could potentially beat him, Pacquiao went for the sure thing in facing Bradley again. I’m not sure if it was Arum’s idea for that fight to take place, but I wouldn’t be surprised. It was a dumb move because if Arum had matched Pacquiao against someone young and talented like Keith Thurman, the boxing world would be going crazy about Pacquiao’s win right now.

Mayweather might then have more interest in making a comeback to face Pacquiao in a second match because the fans would be pushing for the fight. The fans aren’t [pushing for the rematch now because Pacquiao didn’t accomplish anything in beating Bradley that he already hadn’t done before in the past.

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“My sense is that Floyd is waiting for something to sort of pique his interest,” Espinoza said. “And if there is somebody out there that people want him to fight and there’s a big push or if he sees a fighter rise up that’s all of a sudden a big challenge to him – I think that’s what he’s looking for, something that will motivate him to get back into camp.”

That somebody isn’t Pacquiao that Mayweather is interested in fighting. If Mayweather is going to come back, it’s going to be to face someone that the boxing world is raving about after they won an important fight. What Pacquiao did in beating Bradley last weekend was hold hat. It was something that he’d already done before twice, which is why it made no sense for the 84-year-old Arum to match Pacquiao against Bradley for a third time. It was a move that Arum didn’t think out too clearly from I what I could see, because it’s such an old tired match-up.

Arum might as well have dragged Erik Morales or Marco Antonio Barrera back into the ring and put them in with Pacquiao, because the accomplishment would be the same for him.
Pacquiao has already said that he’s retiring now because his family wants him to retire. He’s about to get elected into the senate in the Philippines, and that’s going to lock him into a six-year term as a senator in his country.

It’s going to be a daily grind for Pacquiao in that job, and he’s not going to have any time to resume his boxing career due to the commitments he has to his new political job. I think it’s going to wear Pacquiao out being a senator. He’ll probably stick it out until the bitter end, but I think he’s going to be regretting his decision to become a politician every day until his office is up.



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